I thought the same thing!

It does, although it's quite thin and made almost only of carbon dioxide, which is why it would be possible to terraform, albeit extremely difficult (plants could slowly turn the CO2 into oxygen).

Ah thanks, plop :) That sounds kinda cool...all that CO2, we could dump a bunch of seeds and water there and let plants create oxygen for us. I know it’s probably a million times more complicated than that though lol. But fun to think about.

Couple big things with Mars that would throw a wrench in that: 1. The atmosphere is so thin that water would "boil" even at its frigid temperature most anywhere, freeze-drying anything organic. (note I say "boil" but it would really sublimate, evaporate directly from the solid to a gas) 2. Removing CO2 and putting O2 into the atmosphere would cause a reverse global warming effect, making it even colder. 3. There's no magnetic field to protect you from the radiation from the sun, so cancer and the like would be a major issue. None are exactly deal-breakers, but they certainly are major challenges to overcome.

Wow that’s really interesting. Thanks for the info :)

I remember reading that one of the things the movie "The Martian" got wrong is that because Mars has such low atmospheric pressure, the sort of storm that caused Matt Damon's character to be left for dead couldn't have happened.

y'all some brainiacs 😀

Lol just had a big ol nerd party 🤣 Yeah this whole discussion had me wondering about that movie The Martian too. Wanna watch it again now and pick it apart for its inaccuracies lol

What Bogrbon added is indeed correct, although as he stated some of those issues could likely be circumvented or remedied. As for the idea of throwing a bunch of seeds around, besides what Bogrbon said, there are some even more immediate issues, such as: - lack of water. Mars does have ice caps, but they're made of dry -i.e., carbonic - ice. It might have some subsurface "normal" water", but not in sufficient amount, and it would likely freeze on the surface; - while chlorophyllic plants turn CO2 into oxygen, that requires sunlight, which means the process wouldn't be as effective on Mars, and it also doesn't happen at night. At night, trees/plants "breathe" normally, i.e., they take in oxygen and release CO2. So they would asphyxiate in an environment with too much CO2. Also, when I said "slowly", I meant something of the order of 1,000 years. We're gonna need more Elon Musks if we want things to go any faster.

😆